All the excitement times X. (X2: X-Men United (DVD))

Member Name: The Duke

Product:	X2: X-Men United (DVD)
Date:	07/05/03 (89 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Good acting and plot, Great special effects

Disadvantages: Not for those with no X knowledge, Too many characters to develop?

From the very first moment the film starts, you don't really have time to pause for breath, despite the slower periods which crop up from time to time within the movie. Why? It's the sheer amount of information that's thrown at you right from the very start. Not that this reduced my enjoyment of the movie in any way, but you'd be hard pushed to describe X2 as a brain dead popcorn movie.

The Story:
From the start, there is an attack on the President of the United States by a mutant who can teleport at will, and a last second attempt by a bodyguard saves the President from an assassination attempt.

Magneto is still imprisoned after his capture at the end of X Men, and Professor Charles Xavier's refuge for mutants is still operating under its disguise as a school for gifted children. Shape shifting mutant, Mystique, is still masquerading as Senator Robert Kelly and she finds out that General Stryker is detaining Magneto and also planning on starting a war against the mutants.

Wolverine has gone into the wilderness to find out the secrets of his past and hopefully eradicate his amnesia. Arriving at where he suspects the answers to his questions are located, he finds nothing but ruins of some buildings and returns to Xavier's retreat.

Xavier decides to visit Magneto's prison to see if he can uncover any clues to the plot behind the assassination attempt, and in doing so gets himself captured by Stryker who has plans for Xavier and his technology. Using information gained whilst disguised as Senator Kelly, Mystique enables Magneto to escape and he is forced to team up with the X Men to stop the war before it starts.

My thoughts:
The cast is added to with new mutants in the form of Nightcrawler (Alan Cumming) and Deathstryke (Kelly Hu) both of whom do an excellent job, but Cumming is really outstanding as the religious German teleporter. Kelly Hu plays her part well, but doesn't really h
ave much to do apart from one fight scene, although she looks good in her nice tight outfit.

Once again, Anna Paquin doesn't get much of a role, which is a shame because as an actress, she's wasted in such a small, supporting part. What little we do see of her is excellent as an X Man (X Person?) to be, friend of Logan and boyfriend of another newcomer, Iceman (Shawn Ashmore). Just as was hinted at in the first, these two may get more exposure in the third, if it's ever made.

The originals continue the excellent job from the first movie with Hugh Jackman quite obviously enjoying his stint as Wolverine. The two so-called big hitters of Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen prove that they're more than capable of enjoying themselves while still turning in excellent performances, and they are supported well by Halle Berry and Famke Jansen who get more screen time during this outing.

While there are more cast members involved this time around, each actor does get a chance to expand their character, with the possible exception of James Marsden who plays Cyclops and doesn't get quite enough screen time for the supposed leader of the X Men. It is an ensemble piece rather than one actor's vehicle despite the story revolving around Wolverine's past.

The film is paced quite highly right from the start with the assassination on the President, and rarely drops until the end. If you are familiar with the first one, then you'll enjoy this as it offers more of the same. The director, Bryan Singer, seems a lot more confident of himself this time around and his action sequences are more impressive (and there are more of them) than in the original. The overall tone of this movie was darker than the first, especially with the under story of "ordinary" humans having to deal with mutants and what this could mean in a bigger picture. This no more apparent when Wolverine, Rogue, Iceman and Pyro (Aaron Stanford) end u
p at Iceman's parents house and he effectively must "come out" and reveal what he really is. As was stated above, there is a huge amount of information thrown at you right from the very start, and it's hard to see how anyone who didn't have some familiarity with the X Men universe could get the maximum enjoyment out of this. At the very least, I'd recommend a viewing of the first X Men movie to get a taste.

The number of special effects shots must be huge, from simple things such as a small demonstration of the X Men's power to huge set pieces like a dam breaking or the X Jet being targeted by US Air Force F-16 fighters, and yet it's all done seamlessly and there wasn't a point in the whole movie where I noticed any shot which looked fake.

The story itself was interesting, and kept me entertained throughout the whole 2 hour running time, and I never looked at my watch one which is always a good sign that I'm being entertained. Overall, I think that X2 is one of those rare things: a sequel that improves on the original. It has a huge cast, but doesn't get swamped, it has loads of special effects but doesn't rely on them and has a fairly complicated storyline, but manages not to confuse or bore you with a running time of over two hours. Thoroughly recommended.

Cast:

Patrick Stewart - Professor Charles Xavier
Hugh Jackman - Logan / Wolverine
Ian McKellen - Magneto
Halle Berry - Storm
Famke Janssen - Dr. Jean Grey
James Marsden - Cyclops
Rebecca Romijn-Stamos - Mystique
Brian Cox - General William Stryker
Alan Cumming - Kurt Wagner / Nightcrawler
Anna Paquin - Rogue
Kelly Hu - Yuriko Oyama
Shawn Ashmore - Bobby Drake / Iceman
Bruce Davison - Senator Robert Kelly

Directed by: Bryan Singer
Running Time: 130 minutes

Summary: